LEWISTON, Maine -- The Bates baseball team led Endicott College 5-3 going into the sixth inning, before the Gulls erupted for 19 runs in the final four innings in a 22-8 non-conference victory Saturday afternoon at Leahey Field. The teams' scheduled doubleheader was cut short in the second inning of the second game due to lightning and rain.

The visiting Gulls, ranked fifth in New England Division III by the New England Intercollegiate Baseball Association, rose to 18-11 with the win. Luke Morse (3-2) earned the victory despite allowing five earned runs over 5 2/3 innings on six hits and three walks. Zac Poland allowed three earned runs on four hits and two walks over the final 3 1/3 innings, to pick up his first save of the season. 

Endicott collected 22 hits, including 12 in the last two innings as the Gulls plated seven runs in the eighth and six more in the ninth. The Gulls took advantage of six walks allowed, three hit batsmen and a season-high seven errors committed by the Bobcats (8-10).

Endicott got on the board in the top of the first when Matthew Paola scored on Harry Oringer's single through the right side, off of Bates first-year righthander Connor Speed (Cumberland, Maine; 1-3). 

But Bates scored three in the bottom of the inning. Senior Rockwell Jackson (Fort Worth, Texas) doubled down the right-field line to score seniors Sam Berry (Hamilton, Mass.) and Nate Pajka (Douglas, Mass.), and then came home on junior Samuel Warren's (Norfolk, Va.) single up the middle.

The Gulls tied the game at 3-3 with two unearned runs in the fourth. Anthony Serina scored when Josh Drew reached on a fielding error by junior second baseman Conor Reenstierna (Lincoln, Mass.), and Drew came home on Dan Zabbo's single to right.

Bates retook the lead with two more runs in the bottom of the fourth. Warren and Reenstierna scored from third and second base, respectively, on sophomore Ryan McCarthy's (Plaistow, N.H.) single to left.

The figurative wheels came off for Bates in the sixth, as Endicott scored six runs on three hits and three Bates errors. Nicholas De Lotto was hit by a pitch to lead off, on a call disputed by Bates head coach Mike Leonard. Serina followed with a double down the left-field line -- another disputed call by Leonard, who argued the ball landed in foul ground. A wild pitch by Speed and a fielding error by Jackson at first pulled the Gulls into a 5-5 tie, and Speed was lifted in favor of junior righthander Chris Ward (Pasadena, Calif.), with no outs yet recorded. Cody Hall's sacrifice bunt advaned Drew to second, before Zabbo walked and Michael DeDonato hit an infield single to load the bases.

Paola then singled to right to give the Gulls the lead for good at 6-5. Oringer was hit by a pitch to make it 7-5, keeping the bases loaded. Mike Kochiss's grounder to first was fielded cleanly by Jackson, but senior catcher Mekae Hyde (Lewiston, Maine) muffed Jackson's throw to home plate for the would-be force out to score another run. DeLotto then hit a would-be double play ball, but an error by sophomore shortstop Brendan Fox (West Hartford, Conn.) limited the play to a force out at second base and allowed Paola to score the sixth run of the inning. Fox then made a diving stab at Serina's liner to end the damage.

After Morse hit Bates first-year Jake Shapiro (Sandy, Utah) with two outs in the bottom of the sixth, Poland came on and struck out McCarthy to hold the lead at 9-5. 

Bates closed it to 9-6 with one run in the bottom of the seventh. Hyde led off with a single, reached third on Pajka's single to right, and scored on Berry's sacrifice bunt. 

Endicott turned the game into a rout in the top of the eighth, as sophomore reliever Matt Doyle (Northborough, Mass.) faced eight batters without recording an out, including run-scoring singles by Kochiss, Drew, Hall and Zabbo. First-year Robert Jones (South Berwick, Maine) came on for Doyle and the Gulls added another run on a fielding error, before he finally got out of the inning by inducing Oringer into a double play and Kochiss into a popup. In the ninth, however, the Gulls reached Jones for six more runs on six hits.

Each Endicott starter had a hit, and eight of them had multi-hit games. Drew was 4-for-6 in the game with four runs scored and two RBIs, while Paola, Kochiss and DeLotto had three apiece. Kochiss drove in a game-high four runs.

Jackson was 2-for-4 with a run and two RBIs for Bates, which totaled 10 hits in the game.

Bates plays a non-conference doubleheader on Sunday at Williams College, starting at 12pm. Endicott hosts a Commonwealth Coast Conference doubleheader against Curry starting at noon Sunday.